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Elderly depression goes undiagnosed in aged care

TIM PALMER: The grumpy old man is probably one of the most common stereotypes of older generations. But such labels could be hiding more serious issues according to mental health organisation, Beyond Blue.

It says one third of people in aged care has depression or anxiety and it wants better training to diagnose and treat the illnesses.

Separately a South Australian project is working to alleviate one of the major risk factors, loneliness.

Rebecca Brice reports.

REBECCA BRICE: Ninety-one-year-old Ken Goody lives in Pinnaroo, a Mallee town about 250-kilometres east of Adelaide.

He's just started using an iPad.

KEN GOODY: I use it quite a lot. When I've got nothing else to do I play games on it and every day I start it up to see if there's any emails because I've got it connected with the internet on me main computer.

REBECCA BRICE: Is that important to you Ken to be able to communicate with people through email?

KEN GOODY: Oh yes, I'm living on me own. I suppose I've got used to it now the wife died 20-odd years ago but I still like somebody to speak to and if necessary I phone up me granddaughter and have a word with her or send an email to me oldest daughter or me youngest daughter and it keeps in touch with anybody.

REBECCA BRICE: Ken Goody became computer-savvy through a pilot program run by Adelaide University and the Murray Mallee Aged Care Group.

He says if it wasn't for his three computers he'd probably be lonely, and the figures for his age group suggest so too.

Professor Graeme Hugo is a demographer from Adelaide University who's been involved in the computer project.

GRAEME HUGO: Many older people suffer from very, very significant loneliness and in a survey we did here in South Australia one in four older people had reported having significant loneliness issues.

REBECCA BRICE: And did they say why they were lonely?

GRAEME HUGO: It's associated with their lack of accessibility. Many of them have lost the ability to drive, or in the case of many women, have never driven and when their husbands have died or become disabled they haven't been able to get around as much as they used to.

There's also physical disability and so on and particularly in rural and more remote areas there's a great deal of difficulty in them actually getting out to actually mix with people.

REBECCA BRICE: Isolation and loneliness are some of the risk factors associated with depression, as are chronic pain and illness, according to mental health organisation Beyond Blue.

Chief executive Kate Carnell says the elderly are far more likely to suffer such an illness if they're in care.

KATE CARNELL: In residential aged care facilities the amount of depression and anxiety is about one in three. That's double what you'd expect out in the community amongst healthier older people.

And in hospitals it's even higher, close to one in two and regularly older people are not having their depression or their anxiety acknowledged or diagnosed so it's not treated and really affects quality of life.

REBECCA BRICE: She says the symptoms are sometimes dismissed as grumpiness associated with growing old.

KATE CARNELL: There's been a huge problem with identifying depression and anxiety in older people. There's very little training for medical practitioners in their course but probably even more importantly there's a real lack of training for people who work in residential aged care facilities or in aged care in the community.

All the more important, Graeme Hugo says, as Baby Boomers start hitting the 65- plus age bracket.

GRAEME HUGO: For the first time we're seeing up to a quarter of people enter old age alone, without a partner. In the past most people have entered retirement with a partner but because of higher incidence of divorce and separation among the baby boomer generation than previous generations it means that more people are going to be entering old age alone.

REBECCA BRICE: He hopes the computer literacy project for seniors will be rolled out across the country.

Ken Goody is one convert to the power of the PC.

KEN GOODY: Oh yeah, yeah. I wouldn't be without one now.

TIM PALMER: The high tech 91-year-old Ken Goody ending that story by Rebecca Brice.